Finally

For years I've complained about the lack of basic protections in the many sheltered workshops in Nova Scotia.  There is no uniform code of conduct for staff and no attempt to educate participants in protecting personal space, consent, relationships, and legal rights and responsibilities.

Serendipitously, I learned that the Nova Scotia Association for Community Living is offering a one day course

Spreading the Word About Healthy Sexuality and Consent for Residential Service Providers

Funded by the Department of Community Services, Innovation Grant, this FREE professional development session is based on the "Doing it Better" curriculum developed by Sexual Heath Nova Scotia and will focus on educating residential service providers across Nova Scotia on strategies that are culturally specific to the Intellectual Disability community.

This particular session (January 31 on Mumford Road) seems full, and it is evidently geared to residential service providers.  Other sessions seem to be planned province-wide

Of course it should be mandatory for any organization providing any services to those with intellectual disabilities, and some version should be offered to participants as well.   But it is a tiny step in the right direction.  

Accessibility Advisory Board - my priority

Friday I had the great privilege of attending (through the miracle of the internet) the inaugural meeting of the province's Accessibility Advisory Board.  It's an impressive and talented group; 6 women, 6 men, 7 with disabilities as required by the Act.

The diversity of interests, experience and priorities is also impressive - accomplished in business, academia, advocacy and government, among other areas.  Special concerns include language, poverty, technology and housing.  All share a common interest in human rights and the perspective it brings.

We had a video greeting from Minister Mark Furey.  As a new board, we spent time on housekeeping - responsibility, privacy, transparency - and other details of governance.

We were briefed on the creative and energetic work of the tireless Gerry Post and the small staff of the Directorate.  They've formed a partnership of the Directorate, the Rick Hansen Foundation and the Community Colleges.  The Directorate has conducted dozens of community meetings and has another partnership with the the Union of Nova Scotia Municipalities.  It is engaged with postsecondary educational institutions.  Wow!

We have a great deal of work to accomplish by September, when a plan is to be sent to the Minister.  We will depend on the excellent staff.

When we were given the opportunity to go around the table to identify priorities, I wanted to be clear that the perilous and inexcusable situation of people with intellectual disabilities in sheltered workshops funded by the Department of Community Services is a different level of problem.  It's a crisis.  I want it to be on the record.  It can be fixed by a simple policy change.

I have written frequently about the associated workshops, called DirectioNS.  We learn from a series done by public radio in the US that people with intellectual disabilities are seven times more likely to be victims of sexual assault.  There are excellent personal safety programs.  There are examples of good policies.  Community Services requires none of these.

The Province can implement effective and uniform protections for people with intellectual disabilities.  The policy needs:

1. a DCS mandated code of conduct for sheltered workshops covering all types of exploitation.
2. police background checks all around.
3. sex education classes for participants.
4. A fair wage for participants - so work is not just rewarded by charity.
5. Consequences
The Province doesn't need to wait for an imposed standard.  It can even postpone the fair wage issue, which seems to be an insurmountable problem.  But please, please do your duty and protect the vulnerable!

Until something is done, it will continue to be my priority.

Gus Reed

Homework for the Law Amendments Committee

Dear Committee,

I was relieved to learn that you have paused the progress of Bill 59. When I initially wrote, I feared that you would continue the juggernaut to pass the Bill and that you were unlikely to incorporate changes. You did the right thing.

Last year, I was honoured to receive an award from the Human Rights Commission for work advocating for people with disabilities. That work and my personal experience have given me a profound sense of the artificial and arbitrary barriers society constructs.

What follows may be hard for you to hear, but successive governments have been extremely tough on people with disabilities. There is a pattern of enacting good and decent laws, but when it comes to people with disabilities exceptions are made and justice is forgotten. For example, public transportation is a good thing, but you couldn't figure out a way to do it equitably, so you invented an inferior version for people with disabilities and hope no one notices. Minimum wage is good for most people, but apparently not for people with intellectual disabilities.

Generally speaking, people with disabilities are too busy dealing with the inequities (and iniquities) visited upon them to organize effectively. The Disabled Persons Commission is the voice of government, not of people with disabilities; the objective of condition-specific organizations like Autism NS is very particular; people are often isolated and don't have a lot in common. Although you will often hear the saying "Nothing about us without us" it can be hard to get at the "Something for us, by us".

You will hear a lot about the structure and process of the Act. It needs:

• Enforceable standards
• not subject to loathsome cost/benefit analysis (who among us would pass such a test?),
• drawn liberally from the many hundreds of successful examples in other jurisdictions,
• seldom requiring a Nova Scotia version
• administered impartially
• enforced with purpose
• supported by incentives and penalties
• all in a timely fashion

Sounds easy, but how will we know it will work?

We want this legislation to solve real problems, not to be mere window dressing. Good legislation is not conceived in a vacuum. Here are four serious, longstanding and difficult problems that should be addressed by the legislation. The Act should open the door for a solution. You can't just wave a magic wand to make workplaces accessible, but you can create the tools to make it happen. This list is not exhaustive, but illustrates the complex nature of the problem.

Employment. Employers are now allowed to discriminate against people with disabilities by perpetuating physical and process barriers. Not one of the hundreds of unemployed Nova Scotians using a wheelchair could get a sales clerk job at Jennifer's on Spring Garden, nor could they work at the upstairs offices of the Waterfront Development Corporation. Why is that permitted?

The Building Code and its cognates are the de facto Charter of Rights for people with disabilities. Who says rights disappear when a building is under 120 square meters? What has a "change of use" got to do with the right of access? Why are disabled veterans prevented from visiting part of the museum at Maritime Command? Is there really a good reason voters with wheelchairs can't use the front door at the House of Assembly? These arbitrary rules don’t belong anywhere near the Building Code, which should be strictly concerned with standards of construction.

Clearly these rules are designed to protect owners and operators from accessibility requirements, simply to save money. These rules don't reflect our values. The expense can be significant, but to protect the rights of all citizens, government has to be on the side of access, not the side of barriers.

• Government must get creative with tax credits, syndication and timing thereof, and other incentives. Those general principles can be enumerated in the Act.
• You need to do the math to demonstrate to yourselves that employment is a far better and more fiscally sound alternative to government support.
• The Building Code cannot be allowed to determine Charter Rights.

Nova Scotia is constantly lamenting the shrinking workforce and declining population, yet here is a significant demographic that is ignored and wasted. We go to great lengths to educate people with disabilities, but we won't give them jobs. How smart is that? "Inclusive" and "Diverse" aren't just nice words - they make economic sense as well.

Transportation. Hand-in-hand with employment discrimination goes a discriminatory transportation system. You yourselves saw the effect of that when people wishing to comment in person were unable to do so on short notice due to the vicissitudes of the separate and unequal Access-a-Bus system. By its very nature it makes people with disabilities second-class citizens. A modern job requires long hours and considerable flexibility. How can that be scheduled a week in advance?

Health. What is the difference between a new hip and a new wheelchair? A cataract operation and a Braille note taker? Hips and knees liberate people just like wheelchairs and service animals do, yet people with disabilities have to crowdfund or rely on charity for this basic need. The Department of the Environment makes an exception to Public Health Regulations requiring a convenient washroom in restaurants. Even commonly accepted rules of hygiene are ignored. Yet again, people with disabilities fall through a policy loophole.

Sheltered Workshops are called Adult Service Centres in Nova Scotia. They are places where the pattern of suspending good laws and policies in favor of expedience is perfected. Despite good intentions, vulnerable people are

• segregated
• not subject to minimum wage regulations
• not protected from abuse

The government, which regulates and finances the whole scheme has policies on diversity and workplace harassment for its own employees, but does not extend the same protection to people in sheltered workshops. It is not rocket science to predict a day of reckoning, embarrassing to government and well-meaning charities. An assault, a shakedown, inappropriate touching - all are to be expected when vulnerable people are sequestered and there is no governing policy. The criminal code has been notoriously ineffective in the past. It recalls our unpleasant history of residential schools and institutions, and more recent lessons drawn from the Incompetent Person's Act. We must be extra careful to avoid past errors.

• There is no consistent policy on sexual harassment, bullying, or financial exploitation. I asked the Department of Community Services for a copy of their policy and received this response: "Individual centres would have their own policies around harassment and their own mechanisms for dealing with participant complaints. We do not have a provincial policy." In fact, most centres have no policy.
• Here is a telling quote from a Director at Rotary House, a sheltered workshop that does routine work for Kohler Windows: "the productivity of the clients at RH far surpasses that of the regular employees at Kolher." Shouldn't they be Kohler employees?

In sum, here is the test of the legislation:

• Will it provide the means to end employment discrimination?
• Will it provide the means to end separate and unequal transportation?
• Will it provide the means to assure equality of health care?
• Will it provide the means to end the unacceptable aspects of sheltered workshops?

Each of these problems is solvable. But they need to be acknowledged for the discrimination they represent, carefully thought through and frequently reviewed.

In pausing, you have acknowledged the depth of the disappointment in the legislation. In pausing, you have signaled a determination to get this important legislation right for its own sake, for the people of Nova Scotia, for people with disabilities, and for your legacy.

Thank you for considering this. Please do not hesitate to call or write if I can be of assistance.

Warren Reed

DirectioNS

"DIRECTIONS Council for Vocational Services Society is a not for profit organization representing 28 member agencies throughout Nova Scotia. The Council's mandate is to assist and support member organizations in the delivery of services that promote the abilities and inclusion of persons with disabilities in the every day activities of their community."

When I did the math last year, taxpayers funded $28,404,968 at 27 agencies in the province. The Department of Community Services accounted for $23.7 million of that.

My purpose is not to alarm, but to be realistic.  There are dozens of examples of vulnerable people being taken advantage of by those who are meant to be taking care of them.  The Nova Scotia Home for Coloured Children, the Shubenacadie Indian Residential School, the Shelburne School for Boys, the Truro School for Girls, sexual abuse in Antigonish diocese by Roman Catholic clergy-- and those are just the local examples.

In sheltered workshops, 83% of participants are intellectually challenged and particularly vulnerable. Most are adults who may not have had instruction in appropriate behaviour, either amongst themselves or with authority figures.

Vulnerable people are magnets to predators. Sex offenders continuously find ways to insinuate  themselves with victims. Bullies, thieves - all look for the easy prey.

It would be nice if nothing untoward ever happened in sheltered workshops. Wishful thinking aside, shouldn't there be a written policy and some effort to protect participants? Without written rules, someone is sure to be hurt.

But it's the law you say.  Isn't that enough?  Well, it was the same law for the priests, the residential school and the Home for Colored Children.   The temptation is to sweep incidents under the rug.

A quick check of the Directions Council website shows a lack of uniform policy about this issue.

• At Colchester Community Workshops, they have an extensive written policy - mostly about client behaviour.
• At Dartmouth Adult Services, the promised PDF file is not linked.
• At Flowercart, client rights are enumerated
• At Penny Lane, and New Leaf, I find nothing.

The Department of Community Services, which funds members of the Directions Council, had this to say:

Individual centres would have their own policies around harassment and their own mechanisms for dealing with participant complaints. We do not have a provincial policy.

An officer of DirectioNS emailed me:

To my knowledge each agency has there own policies on this and the Directions Council has suggested standards.  

If I was a parent, employee, director, or donor, I'd want clarity and direction. As a taxpayer, I want the Department of Community Services to impose a minimum set of policies and procedures. Everyone involved needs reassurance that participants are safe and boundaries are understood and enforced. This needs to include:

• Definitions
• Mandantory education
• Dispute Resolution
• Involving Law Enforcement
• Background Checks
• Clear chain of authority
• Consequences

L'Arche has an excellent example of a straightforward, comprehensive and thoughtful approach to the problem. Supporters and operators of workshops would be irresponsible not to insist upon such a policy.  

A new agenda

On October 15, 2008 I wrote an agenda for access in HRM.  Although there are some successes, much remains to be accomplished.  It's become clear that physical access is only part of the problem.  Uneven government services have a disproportionate and cascading effect on people with disabilities.  Government is not responsible for the diversity of human potential, but must be accountable for a fair allocation of resources.

In a classic feedback loop, lack of appropriate housing, parochial regulation of infrastructure,  little workplace diversity and inflexible transportation act together to limit opportunity.  There are perverse incentives, like having to refuse work in order to keep Pharmacare benefits.  There are unintended consequences, like narrowing opportunity by restricting training. 

This downward spiral isn't unique to people with disabilities.  People in rural Nova Scotia have limited transportation choices, single parents have unmet daycare requirements, people of color still face prejudice in many forms.  But what is unique is government complicity in erecting barriers and the lack of effort to remove them.  Poor infrastructure standards limit mobility.  Bad by-laws make access difficult.  Transportation alternatives are inadequate.  Pharmacy needs make independence difficult to achieve.

This is a waste of the human capital so eagerly sought in Nova Scotia.  To make our system run better, we need to identify, quantify, and change wasteful practices.  There are seven municipal and provincial programs that should be carefully evaluated, with access to jobs as the first priority:

1. Access-a-Bus

Gerry Post has been very thorough and creative in his review of this "service".  He has identified substantial savings and improvements.  Yet we continue to operate this expensive and ineffective program.  Saving a couple of million dollars and improving service doesn't require further deliberation.

2. HRM By-Laws

The encroachment by-law discourages owners from retrofitting entrances for accessibility.  That needs to change, so accessibility takes priority.  Similarly, the Heritage Property By-Law must be reworked so people with disabilities can enjoy their history.  Each By-Law needs to be reviewed to remove barriers to work, commerce, culture, and leisure.

3. HRM Red-Book Standards

Paul Vienneau and Gerry Post  are urging HRM to amend its Red Book standards by adopting existing accessibility standards from other jurisdictions.  Halifax is not unique, and good standards for urban infrastructure are available worldwide.  We should cherry-pick the best, rather than designing our own.

At the same time, process and service standards must be articulated.  Snow removal and temporary construction need special attention.

4. Accessible Nova Scotia

The forthcoming Accessibility Legislation needs to undergo public scrutiny.  It has the potential to be the best in Canada - we need to keep our eyes on the prize

5. Roadmap

This is year two of Community Service's implementation of its plan to transform services to people with disabilities.  Recently, that process was reviewed and given a failing grade by the Nova Scotia Association for Community Living.  We need to know more about the delays.  DCS should be much more transparent about wait times, number of clients and expenses.

6. Sheltered Workshops

All across Canada, abuses of 'training' programs have come to light.  In Nova Scotia, there are many such programs operating with exceptions to minimum wage standards.  We need to be assured that there are written standards for length of training and determination of eligibility.  Lack of transparency raises questions of conflicting incentives.  We need to be sure people are not exploited.

7. Workplace Diversity

The province has a workforce diversity policy that is interesting.  It hasn't gone so far as to do anything (2.7% of 11,407 public service employees are people with disabilities vs. 11.5% of the workforce in Nova Scotia) but at least it's counting.  HRM, with about 4,000 employees, is only beginning the process of counting.  This is probably the most important item on the list

There are a thousand other concerns, large and small.  Portable ramps, government sponsored events, outdoor patios.  If we take care of the big ones, these may follow on their own.

Gus Reed

Accounting for Sheltered Workshops

Readers will remember the recent case of Terri-Lynn Garrie, an intellectually disabled Ontarian woman who was paid just $1.25 an hour as a labourer at a packaging company for 10 years.

In the ground-breaking ruling filed last year, the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal awarded her $142,124 in lost wages, $19,613 in lost income for discriminatory termination and $25,000 in compensation for “injury to her dignity, feelings and self respect.”

We could avoid that kind of situation in Nova Scotia by changing how we think of government supports for those who cannot pursue regular employment.

If you total the annual federal, municipal and provincial grants to the 27 sheltered workshops in Nova Scotia, known as Adult Service Centres and associated as 'New Directions', you get $28,404,968. Divided among 3000 workers  (my very rough guess), you get $9468/year each.  Workers are euphemistically called 'clients'.

In addition, the workshops produce $8,355,868 in sales annually - another $2,785/year for each client.

For their labour, workshop clients receive up to a few dollars a day in the form of a stipend.

The grants go directly to the 27 agencies. By analogy, Nova Scotians receiving EI benefits would have payments go directly to their landlord or to Sobey's. We wouldn't stand for that. It seems we have been persuaded that some Nova Scotians are completely unable to fend for themselves, so we give their benefits to a third party instead.

This is the kind of circular argument so often used against people with disabilities.  "It's obvious this person can't manage money - they don't even have a chequebook!"  And with that, we won't let them have anything to put in the chequebook.  Meanwhile, we make poor financial decisions on their behalf - preventing them from having assets, planning for their future, or exercising choice.

At the same time, many people working in sheltered workshops are receiving living allowances for group homes of various kinds, assistance at home and work, or self-managed care. From this 2008 article, I'm estimating that these costs are at least $12,000 a year. Again, in most cases, these payments are made directly from the province to the provider.

Totaling  the government payments, you get $21,468 per participant.  An average figure, and I'm sure there are many complications, but we're in search of solutions, not problems.

Meanwhile, we have some other rules in play, like minimum wage legislation, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, and legislation about guardians and incompetency.

The minimum wage in Nova Scotia is $10.60 - $21,200 a year. Adult Service Centers are exempted, creating a class of Canadians to whom minimum wage legislation doesn't apply.  We need to take care with this important measure of our fairness.

Article 19 of the oft-cited-but-rarely-observed UN Convention requires that:

a. Persons with disabilities have the opportunity to choose their place of residence and where and with whom they live on an equal basis with others and are not obligated to live in a particular living arrangement; 

b. Persons with disabilities have access to a range of in-home, residential and community support services, including personal assistance necessary to support living and inclusion in the community, and to prevent isolation or segregation from the community; and 

c. Community services and facilities for the general population are available on an equal basis to persons with disabilities and are responsive to their needs.

and Article 27 requires signatories to:

b) Protect the rights of persons with disabilities, on an equal basis with others, to just and favourable conditions of work, including equal opportunities and equal remuneration for work of equal value.

And in case you haven't heard me quote the Charter of Rights in the last 5 minutes:

15. (1) Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability.

Here's the deal:

Pay the amounts directly to the participants, as if it was a wage.  They or their guardians can then choose which programs to participate in and pay for them.  Many of the other conditions of the various programs would apply - some means testing, coordination of benefits - whatever.

In case you think this is just sleight of hand:

• It respects the Equal Protection section of the Charter
• It respects the living and wage provisions of the UN Convention
• It respects the province's minimum wage laws (and future increases)
• It acknowledges the power of the marketplace
• It affirms ideas of independence, self reliance and choice
• It transforms people from commodities to consumers

It makes sheltered workshops accountable to their customers, not to government.

None of the underlying concepts are new.  Choice, Equality and Good Lives in Inclusive Communities, a roadmap for transforming the Nova Scotia Services to Persons with Disabilities Program, was submitted to The Honorable Denise Peterson‐Rafuse Minister of Community Services by The Nova Scotia Joint Community‐Government Advisory Committee on Transforming the Services to Persons with Disabilities (SPD) Program in June 2013.

That document has all the right ideas, and includes the notion of paying supports directly to beneficiaries.  Another way of doing the same thing would be a guaranteed income, which has occasionally been floated in Canada.

So every Friday full-time participants would get a deposit for $424 in their bank account.  Their share of profits from sales at their place of work is deposited separately.  They'd get a bill for overhead and specific services provided, such as attendant care, meals and transportation.  They'd get a bill for their housing with similar additions.

There will be a thousand objections.  "Some people will need special lunches."  "Some will choose not to participate."  Some will need highly skilled attendants."  "Some will be more productive than others."  These are insignificant compared with the message of fairness and equality.  

Participants or legal guardians would pay the bills.  If there was anything left they could contribute to an RDSP or buy a Mother's Day present.  If the work at some workshop was too hard or the attendant care inadequate, they could shop elsewhere.  Workshops would respond to market forces - hiring more attendants, producing better meals, cutting overhead, turning up the heat.  Some workers might see the attraction of entering the workforce - to make more money or get retirement benefits.  That would ease the burden on the taxpayer.

Once again, all I ask is that my questions get answered:  Are my calculations plausible?  Did we mean anything by accepting the roadmap?  Is anyone doing anything else?  This idea is simple, easily implemented and profoundly empowering.

It's like buying something.  If you don't like it, don't spend your money.  Jenn Power of L'Arche wrote in an article entitled 'The Right to Choose":

People with intellectual disabilities should have a diverse range of employment options to choose from.

There is no better way to ensure choice than to enable people economically.  We can be proactive, or deal with the chaos when courts challenge the present model.  Just a  matter of time.

Gus Reed

ps another useful article.

Sheltered Workshops

Last March I wrote about sheltered workshops.  This week we have had an opinion piece in The Globe and Mail about the closure and reopening of such an establishment in Ottawa and a thoughtful response from Jen Power of l'Arche.  I had started to assemble some data last September, but got sidetracked waiting for other info.  But here's what I learned (all data is from 2013 CRA returns):

In Nova Scotia there are 29 such agencies, supported by the Department of Community Services, associated as New Directions.  I haven't located 2 of the 29 Canada Revenue returns - Green Door and L'Atelier De Clare, so my numbers represent 27 agencies.

In 2013, they received $23.7 million from the province, 57% of revenues.

I was interested in the way the revenue stream is structured and the amounts regular employees (not the workshop participants, but their supervisors) are paid.

So on average, 20.1% of revenue comes from selling the products of the workshop.  I guess it's no surprise that salaries make up two thirds of expenses.

As far as I can determine, the figures for salaries do not include any compensation for workshop participants - 'clients' as they are called.  If they are paid at all, they receive a per diem from Community Services that is not part of the expense stream for the workshop.  'Other Expenses' are business related - rent, travel, office supplies, advertising, utilities and the like.

As an example, Flowercart in New Minas has $2,766,953 in expenses, of which $2,442,531 is salaries for 27 full time and 6 part time employees. This roughly agrees with the 23 employees enumerated on their website.  Meanwhile, 200 or so 'clients' generate $1,604,537 in goods which are sold, and the raw materials cost $97,381, yielding a profit of $1,507,156.  None of the profit goes to the workers, but it pays 61.7% of the regular employees' salaries.  Just who is working for whom?

On its Social Snapshot page, Flowercart shows the somewhat ambiguously worded Wages paid to clients hired by The Flower Cart of $1,001,480.  If, somehow, this is part of the CRA total expenditure on compensation, it would mean the average salary of the 27 full-time employees is reduced accordingly and 'clients' do get some compensation.  There just isn't enough information to make sense of this figure.

When I wrote last March, I focused on the fact that workshops are exempt from Nova Scotia's minimum wage, I had a very interesting exchange with a couple of parents of participants, who defended the practice on the basis that the operations couldn't exist if they paid minimum wage.  The most telling comment was:

I believe that our workshop still does packaging and assembly work for (a local company). I have no idea what the compensation is, but the productivity of the clients far surpasses that of the regular employees at (the local company).

I've seen some articles which indicate that while it may take four or five steps to train a regular employee for repetitive, tedious jobs, it takes a dozen or so steps to train people with the types of challenges that the clients have. However, after training, the challenged individuals are far more productive and able to tolerate the repetitive nature of the tasks.

I left it there, but the obvious problem is that very capable employees receive nothing for their labor and somehow are kept from trying their skills in the workplace.

In 2008 DCS did a review of 38 agencies operating sheltered workshops (some apparently not New Directions members).  They profiled participants:

The 38 agencies reviewed (includes Adult Service Centres and residential day program providers) provide services to 2,151 participants across the province. Of these:

• ƒ 83 percent have a primary diagnosis of intellectual disability; 
• ƒ 41 percent have a diagnosis of mental illness; 
• ƒ 27 percent have mobility issues and 13 percent have visual challenges; 
• ƒ 16 percent require 1-1 assistance to eat; 14 percent require 1-1 assistance for toilet use; and 23 percent require 1-1 assistance to take required medications during the day; 
• ƒ 32 percent of the individuals currently receiving service reside with family members, including aging parents, while 51 percent reside in a residential program funded by the Department of Community Services. The remaining 17 percent reside in various independent situations. 

There is no corresponding data for 2014, though, based on per participant funding, I would guess the number of participants is now closer to 3000.

Some comments:

Pay

How is it that highly productive workers - "but the productivity of the clients far surpasses that of the regular employees at (the local company)" are not employees of the local company, receiving benefits and the fruits of their labor?  Why should it be their responsibility to augment the productivity of less capable workers?

When you go to Wal-Mart you meet good employees and bad.  The province has said they all must be paid at least minimum wage.  But not at community workshops.  Confusion about whether individuals with differences are objects of pity or real people pervades the culture, and this issue of fundamental fairness will come to define us.  We need to think it through.

Work

We confuse work, which is mere calorie burning, with it's purpose, which is self-determination.  We say we like work, but what we really mean is that we value independence and relying on ourselves. When Laurie Larson, president of the Canadian Association for Community Living says people with disabilities deserve “real jobs for real pay,” she means they are entitled, wherever possible, to independence.

Governance

What are the incentives for moving participants into work?  Agencies receive 20% of revenue from the labor of their clients. (On CRA returns this is Total revenue from sale of goods and services (except to any level of government in Canada) minus Purchased supplies and assets).  Moving the best workers out would jeopardize an important source of income.

As they say in the 2008 report:

Many of the staff we met during the review offered examples of persons with disabilities who became top performers within the work area, and who, when given the choice of leaving that environment for a position within the community, chose to return to the environment. This is not to say that the opportunity of employment in the competitive labor force should not be offered as an option. It does, however, suggest that informed choice is a key to the success. 

This sounds reasonable, but leaving this decision in the hands of those who stand to benefit opens agencies to questions.  It's the worst possible optics.  With two-thirds of expenses going to salaries of administrators, and funding doubtless tied to participant numbers, motives can be confused.

Community

Although the provincial government has a workforce diversity policy (which includes people with disabilities), they countenance and support operations that are uniformly made up of disabled people, most of them intellectually.  How is it that herding people with disabilities into a room together fosters workplace diversity?  Community integration?  Independence?  You can argue the merits of the policy, but you can't argue that the government violates it.

Thoughts

To make this work, we must be unambiguous about what we do.

• End the exceptions for minimum wage.
• Carefully distinguish between work and euphemisms like 'work activity'.  People in adult day care programs don't need to be paid.  Workers do.
• Make funding contingent on successful training and placement into the diverse workforce.
• Remove administrators from decisions about placement.
• At the very least, put the full value of uncompensated labor into an RDSP, so workers have some future certainty
• Unless there is reform from within, these peculiar institutions will be simply swept away for their injustices.  The good will be tossed out with the bad and the losers will again be people with disabilities.  

Data

Here is a map of locations of New Directions Participants, showing the average full time salary of paid supervisory staff (2013):

and here is something to compare them:

And for the truly interested, source data to play with:

As always, comments are eagerly sought.  wcreedh@gmail.com.

The road to Hell

We've all heard the news that the 85 richest people have as much money as the entire poorest half of the world.  This is part of the conversation in the US, where President Obama wants to raise the minimum hourly wage to $10.10.  There are the usual arguments from greedy Republicans that raising the minimum wage will lead to layoffs.  The Gap knows better, and has already committed to meet a $10 threshold because it's good for business.

In Nova Scotia, the minimum wage for experienced employees is $10.30.  So we're righteous.  Right?

Meanwhile in Ontario, the Human Rights Tribunal just awarded 10 years of back pay to a woman who made $1.25 an hour.

This woman, Ms. Garrie, has an "intellectual disability" and worked in a bottling plant, packaging wine.  You should read the decision to appreciate the arguments.  And a very informative broadcast.

The owner of the business sent a letter to the tribunal saying Garrie was a “trainee” and not an employee. As a trainee, she was paid an honorarium amounting to about $50 a week so she could continue to receive Ontario Disability Support Program payments without triggering claw-backs.

There are a ton of exceptions to the minimum wage requirement in Nova Scotia:

• Camp counselors
• Salespersons on commission
• Agricultural workers
• Trainees
• Apprentices
• and the mysterious "employees for whom there are special orders by the Governor in Council"

By way of comparison, this comes at a time that we learn the CEO of Emera earned $4.7 million last year.   That's $2,350 an hour.  228 times the statutory minumum wage.   1,880 times what Ms. Garrie made.  Mr. Huskilson makes more in 60 hours than her award for 10 years of back pay!

I would guess that if a woman in Ontario made $1.50 an hour, it's happened here in Nova Scotia.  It certainly happened in Iowa, as the New York Times reported last week.  That was all about agricultural workers, another exempted class in Nova Scotia.  

In the US, the National Council on Disabilities eloquently urged President Obama to extend his minimum wage order, saying that a subminimum wage

is a policy relic from the 1930s, when discrimination was inevitable because service systems were based on a charity model, rather than empowerment and self-determination, and when societal low expectations for people with disabilities colored policymaking. NCD stands for the principle that no person with a disability should be discriminated against in an employment setting by being paid less than the minimum wage available to all other citizens.

The letter is worth reading.

And in Ontario, the Human Rights Tribunal "urges the province’s human rights commission to determine if the practice of paying less than minimum wage is widespread, and if so, to advise the province on how to stop it."

In Canada, Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan explicitly allow lower wages for people with disabilities.  In Nova Scotia, there are dozens of charities using the 'trainee' rubric.  It would be reassuring to know about their pay scales and the `trainee` positions.  How long do they typically last? Do trainees move into regular jobs?   

The 2013 report Choice, Equality and Good Lives in Inclusive Communities submitted to the Department of Community Services says: "the Services for People with Disabilities program currently funds thirty Adult Service Centres (ASCs). These service providers deliver a system of vocational services largely through segregated, sheltered day programs and represent the predominant response to the employment needs of people with disabilities".  

Whatever the arrangement, those people are better off in the workplace you say.  Some have high needs and the employer can provide supervision and other services.  That may be, but it shouldn't be necessary to bend the rules to help people.  Pay the minimum wage, account for supervision and services.  Show us the math. 

Those people.  Not someone like me, right?

I wrote to Easter Seals Nova Scotia on March 9 to inquire about their wage practices.  They operate a variety of businesses on the sheltered workshop model.  I have received no response as of the 23rd.  Is there a problem with asking?

No doubt sheltered workshops are operated with good intention.  The pavement of the road to Hell.  But that doesn't make it right, or even legal.  How can it possibly benefit anyone to be treated as second class citizens?  Confusion about whether individuals with differences are objects of pity or real people is exactly why Nova Scotia needs credible and enforceable legislation.

Our notoriously ineffective Human Rights Commission could conduct an investigation, as they are empowered to do.  Or the Disabled Persons Commission could see if people were being served by this "training" loophole.  Trust me, that won't happen.

Barbara Hall, chief commissioner for the Ontario Human Rights Commission, welcomed their ruling.  “The fact that we intervened in the first place shows we are really concerned about this issue and the seriousness with which the tribunal took it is very important,” she said.

So we call on sheltered workshops to publish and explain their wage scales and record of job placement.  Perhaps, to protect their reputation, they will insist on a Human Rights Commission ruling.

Gus Reed

PS Here`s something from Ohio.  It would be interesting to know how Nova Scotia compares: